I've been out of the game, what have I missed?

It has been a while since I built my last loop. Oh sure, my hardware isn't that old, but it has been essentially the same loop for 10 years now.

I am looking at keeping my current pc hardware but downsizing to a matx board and a smaller case. Unlikely that I am fitting my current 480 and 360 radiators in there. Plan to re-use the pump, CPU block, and maybe the 240 and 120 rads from my signature. I just ordered an alphacool block for my 4090FE.

So I guess my question is whether it is worth replacing the old XSPC raystorm block? Any different radiators I should look at? When I was last in the game XSPC was the budget player at a step up from ebay. Higher quality chinese stuff was just starting to show up. Everyone hated EK for nickel plating and bubble designs. People were just being introduced to rigid tubing. At the same time it felt like true loops were dying out because of AIOs.

So what bang for the buck 240s should I look at? Fans? CPU blocks?

block is fine. if rads are all copper those are fine too. so as long as everything fits, youre prob good to go.
if youre going to drop to a aio, grab an arctic.

As long as they can still mount and haven't corroded, these parts are all fine. (and since you are saying you are re-using the same hardware, I presume that means the same CPU socket, so I don't see why they wouldn't mount)

I'd open up the blocks and give them a good clean, as well as flush out the radiators, but other than that you are probably good.

Exactly what Zarathustra[H] said. Arguably the only part that wears out is the pump. Everything else just goes out of style or or is surpassed by a new product.

Bykski is probably the new "budget" WC player. But people seem to like them.

Biggest issue is cooling that 4090FE plus a cpu. A 120 and 240 can do around 100+200 watts of heat depending on thickness and make/model, unless you dont mind noisy high speed fans. The 4090FE does around 450 watts under load.

You may need to get a new CPU block if only because there's not a mounting kit available, you could fabricate your own depending on what platform though.

termite said:

Exactly what Zarathustra[H] said. Arguably the only part that wears out is the pump. Everything else just goes out of style or or is surpassed by a new product.

Bykski is probably the new "budget" WC player. But people seem to like them.

Biggest issue is cooling that 4090FE plus a cpu. A 120 and 240 can do around 100+200 watts of heat depending on thickness and make/model, unless you dont mind noisy high speed fans. The 4090FE does around 450 watts under load.

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Thanks. Good to know about the watts. Yeah, I would like something like a 2x 240mm and 1x 120mm but I'm noticing that a lot of the "watercooling" cases just mean a AIO cooler. It seems like a lot of cases are trying to do everything and end up doing nothing well.

D-EJ915 said:

You may need to get a new CPU block if only because there's not a mounting kit available, you could fabricate your own depending on what platform though.

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I already had to get the AM4 mounting kit for the raystorm block years ago. So I'm good there. I think my question is more whether this block that was designed like 15 years ago or more is still providing cooling to the right spots for my AM4 CPU.

If ram prices weren't crazy I would just do a AM5 upgrade now but c'est la vie.

Gorilla said:

Thanks. Good to know about the watts. Yeah, I would like something like a 2x 240mm and 1x 120mm but I'm noticing that a lot of the "watercooling" cases just mean a AIO cooler. It seems like a lot of cases are trying to do everything and end up doing nothing well.



I already had to get the AM4 mounting kit for the raystorm block years ago. So I'm good there. I think my question is more whether this block that was designed like 15 years ago or more is still providing cooling to the right spots for my AM4 CPU.

If ram prices weren't crazy I would just do a AM5 upgrade now but c'est la vie.

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Yeah it should be perfectly fine, newer blocks are better but it's not such a huge difference that it would be worthwhile imo unless you have it pegged 24/7 at 100%.